Tiburon defrauder sentenced to seven years, ordered to pay $8.6 million

A former Tiburon money manager who swindled 13 investors, including a former Tiburon mayor, was sentenced to seven years in custody Monday and ordered to pay more than $8.6 million in restitution and fines.

Glenn Kane Jackson, 47, was sentenced in accordance with a plea deal in April, when he admitted to 27 counts of securities fraud and grand theft.

Under sentencing guidelines, Jackson received 2,300 days of credit against his sentence for time served and good behavior, so he will likely be free from prison within months.

One of his victims, Hans Beha of Tiburon, told the court the "ultra soft" sentence "seems like a bad joke." He also has a civil lawsuit pending against Jackson and the banks.

"We don't need people like him in society," said Beha, who lost about $450,000 to Jackson. "Get rid of him and put him behind bars."

Jackson and his wife, Gina McGee, were arrested in 2010 after an investigation by the Tiburon Police Department. The couple, operating a company called Highlands Capital Partners LP, promised high yields through low-risk investments in foreign currency exchanges, authorities said.

The couple collected millions of dollars from their investors, spent huge sums on personal expenses and also lost money through bad investments, authorities said.

Many of the victims were Tiburon and Belvedere residents, including real estate brokers, a lawyer, a finance executive and former Tiburon mayor Andrew Thompson. Thompson lost about $275,000.

Many victims invested based on the recommendation of Kirk Hanson, a real estate agent and former Tiburon mayor. Hanson, who received five-figure fees for bringing new clients to Highlands, was under investigation himself for potential criminal charges, the district attorney's office said.

Hanson died from rare blood disease before prosecutors could determine his involvement.

Gina McGee took a plea deal in 2011 and was released from jail a short time later. She did not appear at Jackson's sentencing Monday.

The sentencing hearing was held before Judge Kelly Simmons. The case prosecutor, Andrea Buccine, called Jackson a "wolf in sheep's clothing" who repeatedly lied to victims by exaggerating his academic credentials, claiming to be a Navy SEAL and concealing his past legal troubles.

"He lived a good life, and he lived a good life on the backs of these victims," Buccine said.

Defense attorney Elissa Lasserre said Jackson was a nonviolent offender who has already been ruined by the case. She noted that Jackson has served years in a small Marin County Jail cell where he was on lockdown 23 hours a day — a condition most state prisoners are not subjected to.

"The sooner he reintegrates (into the society), the sooner the victims will be made whole," Lasserre said.

Jackson showed little reaction during the hearing. At one point he started to make a statement to the judge, but Lasserre advised him not to because of the pending lawsuits against him.

In addition to the prison time, Judge Simmons ordered Jackson to pay about $3.8 million in restitution to the victims, which includes their original investment and 10 percent interest. She also fined him another $4.8 million under guidelines for white-collar crimes.

Jackson is also facing a separate complaint by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

Jackson's company had no connection to Highland Capital Partners, a venture capital and investment firm based in Menlo Park, or Dallas-based Highland Capital Management.